All the Lights are Shining
by CherryBerry12
Summary: Naruto only has a vague idea of what Christmas is, but that won't stop him from celebrating anyway. Naru/Gaa. Fluff.


"No, no _trust_ me, it's definitely supposed to be exactly like that," Naruto explained as he led Gaara around his small living room.

"It just seems off somehow," Gaara commented, circling the small oak tree centered in the middle of the room. It was taller than both of them and Gaara couldn't help but wonder how Naruto had managed to dig it up and get it in his apartment.

As a matter of strength, well, he had full faith in Naruto. As a matter of grace and maneuverability… Gaara couldn't help but think the tree was in surprisingly good condition.

"Well, Kakashi-sensei said most people usually get fake trees these days, that might be why," Naruto said, knocking his knuckle against the thin trunk of the tree.

"It's just so… tall."

"Most trees are tall, Gaara."

Gaara was unsure if his lack of enthusiasm had begun to upset Naruto and so he did not respond for fear of further dimming his spirit.

Naruto huffed and clapped him on the back. "Awe, come on! It probably just looks weird because you've never done this before. I bet in Yuki or whatever country Kakashi-sensei visited this is totally not weird at all!" Naruto paused, scrunching his nose in thought. "I'd kinda like to know what we're supposed to do with the tree afterwards, though."

This was, thankfully, more familiar ground for Gaara. "A cactus probably would have been easier to manage. What are you going to do when it grows too large to keep?"

"Well. Kakashi-sensei said the tree is only brought out for the holiday, but um… I don't remember what else he said," Naruto replied with a cheeky grin. "I guess we can just replant it and dig it up next year? Or get another one if it won't fit anymore…" Naruto tapped his cheek for a moment before shrugging. "It's the sentiment that counts, though, right?"

Gaara nodded along even though he was completely lost. "Right. The sentiment."

A dead silence fell between them and Gaara was not sure if he should be the one to break it. Beside him, Naruto was still staring at the tree, beaming with the sort of innocent pride only someone with as pure a heart as Naruto's could manage.

Gaara cleared his throat. "What… I mean, which sentiments are we talking about here?"

Naruto paused for a moment. "Ah… Happy things! Peace, hope, joy! You know, Gaara, shinobi values," which Gaara mentally corrected to _Naruto's shinobi values._

"How does a tree represent that?"

"It… It just _does_. Trees are happy. Peaceful. What's not to like about a tree, huh?"

Gaara didn't have a good answer for that, and so they lapsed into silence again.

"So what do we do now?" Gaara eventually asked.

Naruto grinned, opening his arms like he was going to hug the entire tree. "We can decorate it!"

"We decorate it," he echoed. "How do we do that?"

Naruto held his hand up as if he were going to say something, but then put it back down, frowning. "Um. Well. That's a good question, isn't it?" He gave Gaara a sheepish grin and rubbed the back of his neck. "That's a really good question."

"Do… do we carve something into it? Are we supposed to paint it?" Gaara looked to Naruto for guidance but was beginning to think Naruto had greatly overstated his familiarity with this holiday.

"Well… Let me see what I have around the apartment and we'll work from there. I could always call Kakashi-sensei but… Hm, I think he and Gai-sensei had plans!"

Gaara smiled, a small, sincere quirk of the lips, and nodded. "We'll make do, then."

Naruto walked over to his kitchen and Gaara heard, rather than saw, Naruto fling open a cabinet door in his kitchen and begin to rummage through it.

Naruto's voice echoed from the kitchen. "Okay! So I have… Well, I have this face paint, a little bit of glue, and ink. Some ninja wire." Gaara walked into the kitchen and saw Naruto was rifling through drawers now, throwing out microwaveable cups of ramen and miscellaneous kitchen utensils, rolls of tape, batteries.

"Oh!" he exclaimed. "I have this, too!" He held up an electric lantern for Gaara to see. "We can make do with that, can't we? I think Kakashi-sensei might have said something about lights, too."

Gaara only nodded, because nothing about this tradition made even the slightest bit of sense to him, but it did to Naruto, and that was what mattered.

Popping open cap on the face paint, Naruto gestured to Gaara. "Okay! Hold out your hands." It wasn't quite fear that settled in the pit of Gaara's stomach but it was something very, very close.

However, it was Naruto who had asked him, and Naruto could have asked for the world and Gaara would given him it.

Gingerly, he held out his hands and Naruto squirted a generous amount of liquid green into his hands. "So," Naruto started, squeezing paint into his own hand, "I was thinking we should write something nice. Like, _hope_ and _harmony_. What do you think?"

Gaara nodded again and Naruto grinned back at him, and somehow Gaara felt a lot less silly than he should have.

Naruto began to giggle as he sat down in the front of the tree. "This is gonna be so cool, man. This is gonna be the best tree decorating anyone has ever seen."

Instead of waiting for him, Naruto began to write in awkward, blocky strokes and about halfway through Gaara began to wonder if he should be contributing or if that would only make it messier. He looked down at the paint in his hands and jiggled it a little bit, only just now wondering why Naruto had green face paint in the first place.

"Yo, Gaara!" Gaara's head shot up, startled out of his thoughts. "You should be the one to write harmony! Your handwriting is probably a lot neater than mine is…"

Silently, Gaara nodded, and when Naruto didn't move Gaara knelt down beside him, close enough that their thighs were almost touching, their elbows only inches apart. Gaara took a deep breath and looked straight ahead, trying to ignore Naruto's very obvious presence next to him. With shaky hands, Gaara drew out the kanji for _harmony_ , suddenly feeling very, very, inharmonious.

He looked over to Naruto for approval and Naruto was _so close_ , close enough Gaara would bump into his if he moved any closer. "Looks nice, right?" he said, and Gaara, once again, could only nod in response, his face heating in a way he could only hope was not as obvious as it felt.

Before he could make anything of it, Naruto rose and Gaara followed, looking for any sort of out. As Gaara left to wash his hands in the kitchen, Naruto was fiddling with the electric lantern, turning off the lights in the living room and eventually placing it at the base of the tree.

"I've got an idea!" Naruto said before running back into his bedroom and running back out with, _was that? Oh god, it was_ , a stuffed plush frog.

"Okay! Gaara, hand me that ninja wire," Naruto said, before pulling over a kitchen chair and clambering onto it. "Watch this!"

To Gaara's utmost confusion, Naruto began to unwind the wire and tied it into loops, first one around his stuff frog, and then another around the tree.

When Naruto stepped down and moved the chair back away, the frog was tied to the tree in such a way to make it seem as though the frog had somehow decided to rest, of all places, on the top of an oak tree.

"He's like a… he's a tree frog now! How about that, Gaara, a tree frog!"

"A tree frog," Gaara echoed, recalling how during the chunin exams Naruto had suckerpunched him into consciousness then headbutted him out of it. This was, somehow, the same Naruto.

Naruto let out a nervous laugh and nodded. "He's a tree frog now."

Before Gaara could begin to really process that, Naruto continued, "So, Gaara… I'm… I'm really glad you could come visit for this, uh, holiday."

"When you invited me I had assumed this was a holiday you usually celebrated," Gaara deadpanned.

"It _is_ a holiday I celebrate! Heh, we're here. Celebrating it. That counts, right?"

Gaara chanced a brief look at Naruto and felt like the breath had just been knocked from him. Naruto was staring back, his eyes wide and hopeful, his lips slightly parted.

"Right… Um. Well. I just think this is a great opportunity because, you know, we don't to see each other _too_ much since you're Kazekage and have so many responsibilities and I know it's hard for you to come all the way out here and, ah, I mean I guess it would be better if I could come to you in the future since I'm still a genin and all but this was a really fun idea and I'm glad you could come since you're supposed to spend holidays with your friends and family and well…"

"Naruto?"

Naruto went silent, worrying his lip between his teeth. He turned to look at Gaara, the light from the electric lantern throwing branch-shaped shadows across the room, the imprint of a leaf covering Naruto's cheek like a tattoo. Gaara felt his mouth go dry as he watched Naruto look down at his hands as he tried to pull his thoughts together.

Naruto cleared his throat. "I mean. It _is_ a holiday for family and friends but… Well. Of course you're my friend and all my friends are family but. Uh. I was just thinking, you know? After seeing you these last couple months and being able to talk more… It's just you're a really cool guy! And, um, I think you're a really wonderful person. One of the best people I know. Um." Naruto turned away from him, nervously fiddling with the zipper on his jacket and quite doggedly avoiding eye contact with Gaara.

"Naruto."

"Uh… Yes?"

"I like you too."

"Oh! Oh, um. Okay! Yeah, great. No, that sounds… Great. Wow." Naruto let out a nervous laugh.

As certain Gaara was that he did _not_ know what the proper holiday etiquette was in this situation, he was equally certain Naruto did not know either, and so there was nothing there to stop him from leaning over and pulling Naruto closer to him, placing a light kiss on his cheek.

"Happy winter holiday, Naruto," he whispered, and when he pulled away Naruto was the most beautiful combination of excited and flustered he had ever seen.

It only took Naruto a half second to recover before he pulled Gaara back with a laugh, his lips pressed so hard against Gaara's that Gaara was forced to tilt his head back to accommodate him, one of Naruto's hands moving to his back to pull him closer, Gaara's heart climbing up to his throat, knocking all of the air out of it.

Naruto's eyes were half-lidded, his lips curled into a smile that was dangerously infectious. "Happy holiday, Gaara," he replied, the words ghosting right over Gaara's lips.

They separated and Naruto grinned, bright enough to light the entire world, and Gaara knew it could. For now, though, the inside of his apartment would suffice.


End file.
